Snowflakes
by mockingjay0916
Summary: After Bella and Edward break up, a chance encounter leaves the both of them stuck together on a chairlift. AH one-shot


You know that feeling you get when you are about to do something that you know you will crash and burn at? Like when you are going to a class with a test you know you're going to fail? Some part of your brain is planning your _James Bond_ escape while the other, and more dominant part, of your brain is making you go anyways. That is the exact situation I'm in now. I'm not headed to a test, however. I'm going skiing.

Whatever made Alice, my best friend, think that I could go downhill at high speeds was completely beyond me. I fall down even at turtle speed.

That was how I got stuck in a car on my way to Horseshoe Mountain, sitting in a car wedged between Alice and Jasper. I had pointed out that putting me in the middle of Alice and Jasper was not very logical but, alas, everyone had thought I would make an escape had I had a window seat. Emmett and Rosalie were in the front of the car with their hands intertwined.

Don't get me wrong, I love that Alice and Jasper, and Emmett and Rosalie are together. They are all so much happier when they are together. But I think they see me as the odd one out. Alice and Rosalie always have some devious plan to push me together with a boy. I just hadn't felt like I needed to date anyone since Edward and I had broken up.

Edward Cullen, a.k.a. Alice's older brother. He and I had gone out for two years but had broken up three months ago. He had gone off to Stanford in September while I had gone across the University of Washington. We had fallen apart in November. It had started off great, but as time had gone on, his emails, calls and texts depleted until they had stopped completely. I had kept emailing him but I never got a response. He never dropped by to say hi when he drove up to visit his family either. Of course, I knew that it would be harder to keep up our relationship while we were at different universities, but I had hope as they weren't too far apart.

I have to admit that I miss looking into his green eyes. I miss the way he ran his hands through his messy bronze-coloured hair. The way he would tease me every time the opportunity presented itself. We had been inseparable since I was three and suddenly not having him in my life was hard.

I snapped myself out of my daydream. We were just pulling up into the parking lot outside the lodge. You have no idea how relieved I was to get out of that car. I could feel the tension between Alice and Jasper. You can only imagine how awkward it was to see Jasper trying to slowly reach over me to Alice.

"Ready squirt?" Emmett asked.

"Never," I said, petrified as I looked up at the hill.

"Just don't die," Emmett advised me.

_Like I couldn't figure that out on my own,_ I thought.

Once Rosalie came back with our passes, I had left the rest of them and headed to the rentals. As I had never gone skiing before, I had to rent all my equipment. I had felt like a fool as I figured out how to get my boot into the skis. It was even more embarrassing as I slowly slid my way to the chairlifts. Alice had told me to take the second chairlift to the top of the hill and she would meet me there to teach me how to ski.

Once I got to the chairlift, I stopped and watched how others got on the chairlift first. It didn't seem so hard to me so I decided to try. As I used my poles to pull me across the snow, I lined up to get on the chairlift. I took a deep breath when it was my turn to get on and slid forward. When I saw the chairlift come up behind me, I, instinctively waiting for the fall, closed my eyes. It was to my awe that I had managed to sit down on the chairlift and next thing I knew, I was on my way up the hill.

I was so excited with my accomplishment that I was throwing myself a mental party. It was only when I noticed the person sitting beside me that I stopped my mental party. He was looking at me like I was crazy. That is when the awkward level on the chairlift peaked. It was just me having made a giant fool of myself and the guy next to me coming to the conclusion that he was on a chairlift with a madwoman. I turned my head away and looked at the people gliding down the hill below me. I could already feel the blood rushing to my cheeks.

Just when I had thought the tension on the chairlift couldn't get any worse, the chairlift jerks to a stop. _Oh, just fabulous_, I had thought, _what else could go wrong_?

There I was, sitting next to someone who thought I was crazy. There was nothing I could do but continue to look at the people below me. I was just hoping that the chairlifts would get moving soon.

I didn't know how long had passed. It could have been seconds. It could have been minutes. But it felt more like it had been hours.

"Attention," a voice radiated through the speakers, "we are experiencing some technical difficulties. We are very sorry folks, but you might be here for a while."

_What else could go wrong_? I asked myself. It had turned out that I had spoken too soon. My phone buzzed in my pocket so I bit my glove, slid my hand out, reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone. My phone had decided to buzz again and slid right out of my hand! I watched in awe as my phone went hurdling towards the snow below.

"No!" I exclaimed. It was so typical for this to happen to me.

"That sucks," the man beside me said.

Once the man spoke, I instantly froze in surprise. I had grown up hearing that voice and would recognize it anywhere. I slowly turned my head to my left to see the man raising his snowboarding goggles to rest on top of his hat. The emerald green that I hadn't seen in forever tore right through me – just like old times. Why was this happening to me? It was like opening up an old, long forgotten drawer full of antique photographs. Just looking into those signature green eyes of him brought back all the laughs, kisses and good times we had together. But it had also brought back the tears, heart break and all the yelling at two in the morning. No matter how much I had tried to bury those memories, good and bad, before, they had found a way to resurface.

Edward Cullen.

"Bella," he breathed. I saw a hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

"Edward," I stated. I did not want to talk to him.

I had promised myself three months ago that I wasn't going to let Edward tear me apart anymore. I wouldn't let him build me up again and have it torn down. I realized after we broke up that our relationship consisted of a lot of yelling at each other and tears. The time that we spent as a couple were amazing but I found it just wasn't worth the heart break that always followed it.

I had originally thought that after our break up three months ago, it would be just like any other time when either one of us, or both of us, would break and we'd get back together. I was hoping and waiting for it to happen just like it always had, but it never did. This had given me time to think about our history and concluded it wasn't worth it anymore.

Unable to look at him anymore, I turned my head to look at the chairlift in front of me. I could still feel his stare on me, but I ignored it. It was when he sighed that I stole a look at him. He had turned his head to his left, away from me. I was hopeful that that was the end of our interactions, so I started analysing the skiers below to figure out how I would get down. I had chosen this hill as it had seemed quite steady.

"You're still the same, aren't you?" Edward asked. His sudden conversation had both shocked me a bit and angered me.

I closed my eyes briefly, trying to contain my frustration at the situation.

"What do you mean?"

"Always analysing everything."

I shook my head and went back to looking at the skiers. I tried to figure out how they shifted their weight, but my mind didn't want to. I kept wandering to that night when it all broke down between Edward and I. Just when I thought I was over it, here the memories of that night come, running back to hit me running.

"Bella," Edward said, trying to get my attention, "Bella." I tried to ignore him again and pretend I was deep in thought. "Bella, you there?"

I swung my head around to face him, "What do you want?" After I said it, I partly regretted saying it that way I did. It was forced and mean – not like me at all.

"Sorry, but I was wondering if you knew the time."

I pulled off my glove to look at my watch. "It's 10:53."

"Thanks," he said, trying to make an effort to be happy.

"Don't mention it," I mumbled.

The chairlift decided to take the moment I was about to put my glove back on to jerk suddenly. Of course, being me, my glove followed my phone's path downwards.

"Shit!" I swore. I could hear Edward trying to contain his laughter. This really aggravated me. "Don't you dare laugh. That was entirely your fault! If you hadn't asked for the time, I would still have my glove with me. Now you owe me a new glove and phone!" I finished heaving. It felt like my blood was boiling underneath my skin.

"Hey, the phone was _not_ my fault," Edward defended.

I was tempted to say that it was. My phone was new, as I had had to buy a new one since that night. After reading the text on my phone, I had sunken down again the wall and thrown my phone against the opposite wall in my dorm. Instead of bursting out at him, which I really wanted to do, I turned away and once again, ignored him.

_How long will it take to fix this chairlift?_ I asked myself.

My plan of ignoring Edward seemed to work, and he seemed to get the gist that I didn't want to talk. That was until he tried to talk to me again.

"Bella," he pleaded.

_Don't listen to him, Bella_, I told myself.

"Bella, please, what happened to us?"

It was then that I snapped. He really had the nerves to bring it up like he was so innocent.

"Really Edward? _You_ are the one asking me what happened to us?"

He seemed quite shocked by my outburst, and I honestly don't blame him, I would have been shocked to had the tables had been turned.

"I tried emailing you, calling, texting – _hell_, I even asked Alice if you were still alive! And then that text I got from you… I couldn't take it anymore. I'm glad you think I haven't changed because you sure have." I felt so good to finally get that out there and say it to his face.

"What the hell are you talking about Bella? You are the one who stopped calling me. I had always looked forward to hearing my phone ring at the exact same time every night and being able to talk to you, but then you just stopped. And the emails from you got less and less frequent! What did you expect me to do, drive all the way up to ask why you weren't returning my emails?" Edward asked. It seemed like he was getting things off his chest as well. As bad as I had felt for him, I refused to let him make me feel bad about what _he_ had done to me.

"Yes! After you sent that text, I was hoping that you would show up and tell me you didn't mean a thing. I was wishing that you would knock on my door, calm me down and hold me in your arms, like you used to."

Edward was about as frustrated as I was at this point. "What damned text?"

I was about ready to punch this boy in the face when he said that. "That '_damned text'_. Don't you dare act innocent with me. I just wish that you had never sent it." I actually felt like I would burn a hole through the chairlift at this point.

"This isn't an act. And you have no right to yell at me like that. After all, you were the one who sent that email!" It figured that the first time the two of us talked again, we were nearly tearing each other up.

"What bloody email?"

"God Bella! The email that you sent me telling me that our long distance relationship wasn't working. It tore me up so much. Do you have any idea what you put me through? I log onto my email, after a really stressful day, to find that you want to end us." Edward looked so venerable that it had taken everything in me to not reach out, stroke his check and tell him that everything would be okay – just like old times.

I took a deep breath and evened out my voice as much as I could. "I swear I never sent that email. I thought we were over once I got that text from you saying that you '_can't wait for tonight'_ and when I asked you want was going on, you said you had sent that to the wrong person."

"Believe me Bella, I didn't send that text."

"Then what happened to all my emails to you? What, someone hacked onto your account and deleted them?" I asked sarcastically.

"Lauren," Edward said under his breath. "Lauren," Edward said louder, more like an accusation.

"Who is Lauren?" I asked. If this was the person that Edward had meant to send this "_can't wait for tonight", _I swear- .

"Lauren is a girl who has been trying to get with me since day one. I gave her my password to _Prezi_ so she could access our presentation and edit it one day while I was sick. She probably tried my password on my email and since then, deleted my emails from you. That _bitch!_" Edward was riddling everything out. When he did this, he was always a bit…. Sexy. "I thought she had gotten over her infatuation with me after I talked to her. She told me she had," Edward was mumbling to himself.

"What about that text you sent me? She can't send texts with just you email password," I pointed out.

"When was the text sent?" Edward asked.

"November 9," I stated. That date was burned into the back of my mind.

I could almost see the gears turning in Edward's head. Then a lightbulb must have gone off in his head. "That is the day I forgot my phone in the library. I had gotten out of class, went to the library to study with Lauren and I forgot my phone there. I went back first thing the next morning but it was right where I had left it. She must have used it."

Everything seemed to be fitting together – that is every piece of the puzzle but one: what email "from me"?

"How did she get my email password? There's no way that you could have gotten an email from me," I stated.

He was continuing to think, but I could tell he was coming up empty handed. And then it hit me.

"Do you have your phone with you?" I asked.

He handed it over to me without another thought. Every time he was engulfed in his own mind, he went on autopilot on the outside and just did what he was told. I went onto his email and scrolled through the contacts. Just like I had predicted, the email listed beside my name was _very_ close to my email but it wasn't mine. My email was . but this email read .. It was such a subtle change that you wouldn't have noticed it had you been looking at it. As much as I hated that girl at the moment, I had to give her a bit of credit as her plan was quite throughout.

"Edward, I think I've solved the mystery." I handed him the phone, and as I had assumed, he didn't notice the difference in the email. "She created another email that's address is very similar to my email. She must had gone onto your account and changed the email under my contact to her new email."

"Hmmm. So I guess that neither of us are to blame for this break up." Edward said.

"I guess so," I trailed off.

The awkwardness was apparent again. Both of us didn't know what to say to each other.

_How long is this chairlift going to be broken?_

My hand was starting to get cold without my glove after a few long minutes of silence. I tired to wiggle my arm back into my jacket sleeve to keep it warm, but that wasn't much of use.

"Here," Edward said and offered me a heat pack.

"Thanks," I said gratefully. I wrapped my hand around the heat pack and placed it in my pocket.

A few more, very long, minutes passed us by.

"So where does this leave us, Bella? I don't want Lauren to be the reason I lose you," Edward said sincerely.

I turned to face him again. Those green eyes, once again turning me into mush. They looked so true.

"Edward, I don't- ," I stuttered a bit, "I don't think that we should get back together. Don't get me wrong, it's a great relief solving the mystery of our fall out three months ago…." I trailed off.

"But?" Edward pressed.

"But I just hate it when we fight. Our break up had given me time to think about the past two years. Fighting for us isn't exactly a foreign concept and I hate it. I hate the nights that I run out of your house crying. The days that my throat hurts from all the yelling. How my heart breaks. I don't think I want to go through all of that again." I said. It pained me so much to say those words but I was finally going on defence mode. I honestly didn't know how much more of this rollercoaster of a relationship I could take.

"Bella, please, you don't mean that," Edward pleaded. "You can't deny that you love me too. Come on, I love you so much it hurts sometimes."

"I know. I don't think I'll find someone I love as much as you, but I just ca-" He cut me off.

"So don't leave me. Give us another chance."

His eyes were starting to water and that pained my heart so much to see.

I don't know why, possibly it was because of his soon coming tears or the fact that he was so close, but I leaned in and kissed him for the first time in over five months. It was a split second decision but I didn't regret it.

I had missed the feel of his lips on mine so much. The way I fit right into him and we moulded perfectly into each other. He was shocked at my actions at first but quickly reacted and deepened the kiss. The sensation sent all my nerves alive for the first time in a really long time.

I broke away finally to find him smiling – beaming really – right back at me. He then reached out and ran his mitten covered hand over my cheek.

"Snowflakes," he said, showing me the two perfect snowflakes now resting on his mitten.

And it was then that I knew that whatever life had to throw at us, I was ready as long as Edward was by my side.

The chairlift then started moving.

"I guess we're moving again," I stated the obvious.

Edward smugly said, "Yes we are."


End file.
